The Beginning of the End
by consistentlyrandom
Summary: ONE SHOT. Takes place after the finale 3x22 - What is going on in Damon's head? Will Elena choose to join the supernatural race or choose death? Explores Damon's feelings.. This is a very, very rough draft with no editing because it's just for a friend..T FOR CURSING AND MY PARANOIA


A/N: This is a very rough document with no editing. I wrote this right after the finale and I'm only posting it because my friend wanted to read it.

. . .

Damon angrily pushed the hospital doors open. His mind was flying a million miles per hour thinking about everything.

How did it come to this?

How did it go from her comforting him about not dying to _her _ending up on her deathbed.

It wasn't fair.

Damon reminisced when Elena was alive. Happy, alive and carefree. Most people would assume that he was thinking about the time when Elena was dating Stefan, the star-football player. No one would guess how far his memory with her could really go.

. . .

_Damon was not in a good place that night. _

_He was laying in the middle of the road, waiting. He wasn't sure what but he knew something was going to happen this night. He could feel it. _

_Then he heard that voice. _

Her _voice._

_He sped over to where she was talking. _

_In truth, he did meet Elena first. He met Elena over the mighty Saint Stefan. Did it hurt knowing that he met Elena first and she didn't even know it? _Hell _yes. But all honesty, he wasn't sure what was better. _

It was like Rose said, Damon was either the best for her or the worst for her.

_When he met Elena, it was before he knew Katherine was out of the tomb. He was still hopelessly in love with the beautiful vampire that turned him into a creature of the night. Damon couldn't say _why _in particular he loved her-she was beautiful and dark and seductive-but he couldn't pinpoint anything else. Selfless? No. Caring? Nope. Loving? No. _

_After Damon figured out that the brunette that he was talking to was not Katherine, he contemplated what to do next. He couldn't blow his cover, he still had to stay in the small town of Mystic Falls to find Katherine. He could either kill her or compel her. _

_But then they started to talk. He didn't lay on the charm like he did with most girls because he felt himself wanting to be real around her. He wasn't sure why but he didn't want to charm the panties off of her. Maybe it was because he was lonely and wanted a real friend. He talked to her as an equal. Something that hadn't happened in a long time. _

_Damon found himself wanting to know what was going wrong in her superficial teenage life. It wasn't like it was going to matter to her in ten years but right now, it was probably everything. And Damon found himself not only curious, but he cared. _

_He wanted to laugh when she said that she didn't know what she wanted. _

_She didn't know what she wanted._

_And when he was talking about the kind of love she wanted, he pictured them together. If he was human, like he was in 1864, he had no doubt that he would've courted this girl and immediately got down on one knee begging for her hand in marriage. All from five minutes with her._

_She was beautiful. Radiant. Charismatic. Lovely. Fierce. Delicate. _

_Perfect._

_As he pictured them in the future while in love with one another, he described what he felt for this silly human girl standing before him._

You want a love that consumes you. You want passion. Adventure. And even a little danger_._

_He would love her to the end of the earth and back. She deserved a love like that. If the boyfriend that she had now was meant to be with her, she would want a future with him and be sure about it. And Damon was sure that he could love Elena with a passion that would consume her world. And with the feistiness that she's shown, he was sure that her love would equally consume him._

_If there was something that Damon was good at, it was loving. There was always some traits that you possessed as a human that carried over and intensified as a vampire. Damon's was his ability to love. He loved with his whole body, heart and soul. Passion would be no problem. With his passion and love for things always came adventure. And this small town girl reminded him of a tiger in a zoo just waiting to get out. Damon wanted to take her somewhere. Everywhere. They would walk the Great Wall of China and eat the best gelato that a small shop sold in Italy that he knew of. They would kayak in the rainforests and swim in the Caribbean. He wanted it all with this girl. And he felt that she wanted it too. _

_It was when he heard a car honk that he felt himself stop making plans for the future with her. The wind blew her hair and he caught a whiff of her vanilla shampoo. _

_She was human. And he was a vampire. A bad vampire. He killed. Mercilessly. He drank blood without remorse. He was not about to corrupt a sixteen year old's life. _

I want you to get everything you're looking for. But right now I want you to forget this happened. Can't have people knowing I'm in town yet.

_He would wait. It was simple. He was a vampire and he had all of eternity. A year or two of waiting for her to mature and figure out life and then he would step back in and they would become friends. Good friends. Best friends. Go out on a date or two. _

_Date some more. Give each other everything they need. Everything they want. Go traveling. Experience the world. Maybe even get married. _

_He shook his head, watching her leave. He hadn't had these thoughts since Katherine in 1864. _

_Then he realized that the whole time that he talked to the doppelganger, he didn't spare one thought for Katherine. _

. . .

It was when he felt Alaric dying in his arms that he realized that those feelings that he first experienced when he first met her only intensified.

Damon was always waiting for the right moment to tell Elena that he met her first. He planned on telling her the day after the night at the motel. He wanted her to remember everything that she felt when Stefan was gone.

But then they fought. Elena told him that she was waiting for him to mess up. Because if he messed up, it would be that much easier for her to decide.

Then he realized he did mess up. She should've known that he met her first. He shouldn't have made her forget.

He wished that he could have justified compelling her but it all came down to one stupid reason. Katherine.

Thoughts were erratic in Damon's mind. He was racing through the hospital in anguish.

"Where is she?" he yelled. He needed to see her. She was dead but he _needed to see her. _

"Where is she!" he screamed. He felt himself slipping. Elena has been he center of his world for a little over a year. It was like loosing the sun. He couldn't see. He was lost.

Damon was stopped by Meredith in his haste to find her. He talked to her, not really caring about what she said until he heard four loaded words that made his world stop.

"_She needed my help." _

"You _what_?" Damon said through clenched teeth, his ocean-blue eyes flaring.

He realized what Meredith was saying but he couldn't process it. Elena as a vampire? She never wanted to be a vampire! She was supposed to stay human, have kids, have a normal life. Never to worry about killing people. To live all eternity hating your existence.

He saw Stefan step out of a room with his head hung and Damon flew at him.

"You god-damn piece of shit!"

Damon was on top of Stefan punching him with every ounce of strength he had.

"You fucking worthless asshole!"

A non-stop flow of obscenities flowed from Damon's mouth. He finally calmed down and got off of his brother. It was then that Damon noticed that Stefan didn't fight back.

Stefan coughed and spit out some blood. The brothers were silent as Stefan wiped the blood off his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Why?" Damon asked in a heartbroken voice. "Why?"

Stefan swallowed and took a shuddering breath. "She…she told me to save Matt. It was like 2010 when I saved her. He dad was…lucid…and he told me to save Elena…if I didn't…she would've hated me."

Damon flew at his brother again and pinned him to the wall.

"That's the difference between you and me, brother," he growled. "You can't live in a world where she hates you but I can't live in a world _without _her at all."

He let Stefan go and walked into the dark room that held one beautiful, young, non-moving patient.

. . .

Damon waited there for an hour when she woke up with a shuddering gasp. He stayed immobile, watching her take her first couple of breaths. A look of surprise was quickly replaced with disappointed and frightened look. She took in her surroundings. Damon sat against the wall on a stool. Stefan stood at the opposite wall, his eyes trained to the ground.

"Elena?"

Damon was first to speak as he moved toward her. He could see tears glistening in her eyes.

"I'm not doing it."

"What?"

"I-I'm not going to transition," Elena whispered. It wasn't what she wanted. And there was no way that she was going to live all of eternity with Stefan while Damon was off in the world avoiding them. She was supposed to spend her life-her human life-with Stefan and then after she died, he and Damon could be brothers again. She would be forgotten and they would continued to do whatever they were doing before she messed with their lives.

_She wasn't supposed to be like Katherine. _

"Elena," Stefan said in a broken whisper after walking to the table she was sitting on. "Please, just-"

"You're going to transition even if I have to force blood down your damn throat." Damon said, his velvety voice low and dangerous.

"Damon-"

Damon's head snapped to his younger brother. "No, Stefan, you can't make decisions anymore. You lost that privilege when you let Elena _die._"

"That's not-"

"Stefan I'm about to shove a stake in your chest. Say one more fucking word."

Stefan stayed quiet.

"Damon, I can't," Elena said. Her head hurt and her brain was all jumbled. She was confused and didn't know what she wanted.

_She didn't know what she wanted…_

A memory quickly flashed through her mind from sophomore year but it flitted away just as quickly.

"Elena. You're going to become a vampire. I'll teach you. I'll share my O negative with you. I'll even let you eat Bambi and Thumper and whatever little forest animal you want. But please, _please. _I-I can't_._ I…Elena, I can live in a world where you hate me for making you do this. As long as I know that you're still _alive. _Well, part of the living dead. So just please, _please, drink the blood."_

_Elena remained motionless and they heard the door open and close. Meredith walked in with a blood bag. She looked apologetically at Elena and placed the bag next her on the table and opened her mouth as if she wanted to say something but then left without a word. _

"_Elena?" Damon asked. If she was leaving this world, he was about to follow right after. He was sure of it. He was not about to spend another 100 years or more on this Earth alone._

_Damon turned to leave the room because he sure as hell wasn't about to watch her die. _

"_Damon…"_

_Damon's hand was on the doorknob when he turned around. Elena's big doe-eyes were trained on him. She picked up the blood bag and with a shuddering breath, took a deep gulp of blood._


End file.
